While we are on the subject (Mexican Coues)

[washingtondc]

I think the white-tailed deer in Arizona all belong to the Coue's deer subspecies. Most deer that straddle the US/Mexico border are of the 3 subspecies (Coue's White-Tailed Deer, Carmen's Mountain White-Tailed Deer, and Texas White-Tailed Deer). These are hardy open savannah/woodland adapted animals with relatively large tails and fairly large/complex antlers (in proportion to body size). One thing to also be mindful, is that white-tailed deer are very adaptable animals and have tremendous genetic variation-even within subspecies.

 

The Coue's deer, as I understand, has one of the widest ranges in Mexico, and lives in the Sierra Madre Occidental that continues from SE Arizona and SW New Mexico. Mexico does have other subspecies of white-tailed deer, but their range is further south of the US borders.

 

I don't know if Arizona and New Mexico have a history of re-stocking deer populations as in the Eastern United States.

 

I know with deer in the Midwest and Southern States, there has been plenty of re-stocking of deer-such that they are possibly hybrids of Northern white-tailed deer, Southern White-tailed deer, Texas White-tailed deer, and Kansas White-tailed deer.

 

The best books I have found available on white-tailed deer subspecies so far, are excerpts in "Deer of the World" by Dr. Valerius Geist, and "White-Tailed Deer: Ecology and Management" by Lowell K. Halls (Editor).

 

I don't know what is going on deer research these days...but I do question the breakdown of subspecies of white-tailed deer in Central and South America. That needs to be revisited, but this would have to be a collective effort on most of Mexico, Central American Countries, and the South American Countries with White-Tailed Deer. This is probably tough due to uncontrolled hunting...and how several deer communities have already dwindled.

 

I have an Audobon handbook of Wildlife of America's Southwest-AZ, NM, UT, NV. It's habitat range for the white-tailed deer is slightly incorrect and based on some inconculsive evidence. I know that the Coue's deer live in SE Arizona and SW New Mexico...but as of date, white-tailed deer do not live in CA, UT, or NV. Many maps of white-tailed deer range show them straddling CA/Western NV border...which is not true.

 

White-tailed deer are largely absent from much of the Columbia basin in Eastern Washington and Oregon. They might have lived along the banks of the Columbia River...but that population has been long gone. The Columbian white-tailed deer of SW Washington and W Oregon are isolated from the Northwest White-Tailed Deer of NE Washington and Oregon's Blue Mountains.

 

Although, I do find it believable that white-tailed deer may someday extend their range into Yellowstone and NE Utah, just like they did in Eastern Colorado.

 

Unfortunately, the map that shows white-tailed deer habitat at the California/Nevada Border and the California/Arizona Border is inaccurate and is in so many books on white-tailed deer.

 

The best range maps are the detailed white-tailed deer density maps found in "White-Tailed Deer: Ecology and Management" by Lowell K. Halls (Editor).

 

 

 

 

[washingtondc]

Well the last post here about Coues in South America got me thinking of a few stories I have heard about a "Mexican Whitetail" roaming around northern Mexico and southern Arizona. I have heard two different people, one from a friend that family has a ranch in the Chiricahua's from the late 1800's till now, and another from a friend in Douglas.

 

They both talk about a deer that is just like the Coues, but the body is just a little smaller and the bucks rack is just like a mini Coues rack. The best way to describe it would be 6 to 8 inches wide and the same tall.

 

I just find it interesting that two people from the same area that don't know each other (just have a mutual friend me) talk about the same deer running From the Chiricahua's to Douglas. And they both call it a Mexican Coues or whitetail. Cant remember.

 

Anyone else heard of them, or are these guys crazy.

 

DD

 

Coue's White-Tailed Deer have the largest range in Mexico and live along the Sierra Madre Occidental that extends from the Chiricahua Mountains of SE Arizona and SW New Mexico.

 

The deer that straddle US/Mexico border belong to one of the three subspecies:

 

Coue's White-Tailed Deer (O. v. couesi)

Carmen's Mountain White-Tailed Deer (O. v. carminis)

Texas White-Tailed Deer (O. v. texanus)

 

These are open woodland/savanna adapted deer that have relatively large/complex antlers and long tails in proportion to body size. There is probably much genetic variation...as is typical of any white-tailed deer population.

 

There are several subspecies identified in Latin America (Mexico, Central America, and South America)...but I think with the latest technology and practices in scientific classification...this subspecies list many need to be revisited.

 

White-Tailed Deer in Eastern USA are largely mixed in the Southern States due to restocking of deer from as far west as Texas and Great Lakes regions)...

 

The problem with the research needed is that many populations of white-tailed deer in Central and South America are shrinking, have disappeared, or vulnerable...due to uncontrolled hunting and human population pressures. As usual...politics...

 

Incidentally, I have seen far too many white-tailed deer books that make the mistake of showing the habitat distribution of white-tailed deer to live in Arizona and Mexico as far west as the Colorado River that borders AZ/CA, or they show white-tailed deer living east of the Sierra Nevada Mountains bordering CA/NV. There is inconclusive evidence for this. Also, white-tailed deer are largely absent from the Columbia basin of Eastern Washington and Oregon. In the Great Plains, they live along river valley bottomlands and adjacent agricultural croplands where they inhabit corn patches.

 

 

There might have been a continuous population that linked the Northwest White-Tailed Deer (NE WA, ID, MT, SE BC) with the Columbia White-Tailed Deer...but that would have been populations along the Columbia River from British Columbia to the Pacific Ocean. The white-tailed deer has largely disappeared from much of the Columbia River in Eastern Washington. Today white-tailed deer are found largely in Idaho, in Washington along the Idaho Border, and Oregon's Blue Mountains. I believe the Columbian white-tailed deer once lived in the Cowlitz River (WA) and Willamette River (OR) valleys...because there is much bottomland mixed forest.

 

I believe that white-tailed deer may potentially extend their range into NE Utah...

 

I have an Audobon handbook of Southwestern Wildlife, but it says white-tailed deer live in N Utah and W Nevada...because it was based on the big old map that is largely inaccurate and placed in way too many books and encyclopedia articles on white-tailed deer.

 

The best book on White-Tailed Deer is White-Tailed Deer: Ecology and Management, by Lowell K. Hall (Editor), and Deer of the World: Their Evolution, Behaviour, and Ecology, by Valerius Geist

 

These two books have the best information so far, on white-tailed deer

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

[billrquimby]

>>>>>>"I don't know if Arizona and New Mexico have a history of re-stocking deer populations as in the Eastern United States.">>>>>>>

 

As far as I know, no white-tailed deer have been translocated anywhere in Arizona, but there was a period very early on when pronghorn antelope from Anderson Mesa and mule deer from the North Kaibab were released across southern Arizona.

 

>>>>>>>>>"White-Tailed Deer in Eastern USA are largely mixed in the Southern States due to restocking of deer from as far west as Texas and Great Lakes regions)..."<<<<<<<<<<<<<

 

Wouldn't this be like introducing a mutt into a population of registered French poodles? In not too many generations the mutt's genes would have negligible effect on the pool. Also, wouldn't the habitat conditions that made a particular race so distinct from others eventually erase the effect of introducing a comparatively few specimens of another race?

 

Bill Quimby

[IHunt2live]

I hope you don't take this the wrong way washingtondc but do you have an education in biology, or are you just an outdoors nut like the rest of use? I'm just wondering because you seem to know a whole lot.

[Young]

For what it's worth, i've known them to be called mexican fantails as well. At least thats what my grandpa calls them. He hunted 34a all his life (1950's-1990's) and has seen them on several occasions. I have also seen them myself near patagonia. I was archery hunting a few years back when i jumped two doe's out of an oak thicket. Both deer were smaller than your average coues deer doe and seemed to me to be a bit darker in color. I also noticed their tails were a dark redish color (before they flagged). Looked like a sub species to me so when i asked my gramps, he called them a mexican fantail. We could be wrong but thats just my 2 cents

[IHunt2live]

For what it's worth, i've known them to be called mexican fantails as well. At least thats what my grandpa calls them. He hunted 34a all his life (1950's-1990's) and has seen them on several occasions. I have also seen them myself near patagonia. I was archery hunting a few years back when i jumped two doe's out of an oak thicket. Both deer were smaller than your average coues deer doe and seemed to me to be a bit darker in color. I also noticed their tails were a dark redish color (before they flagged). Looked like a sub species to me so when i asked my gramps, he called them a mexican fantail. We could be wrong but thats just my 2 cents

 

A tail like this? This deer came out of 34A but it was not miniture coues, he was the biggest bodied coues I've ever delt with.

[IHunt2live]

I just read the section in "Deer of the Southwest" by Jim Heffelfinger were he mentions this. He says "its a common misconception" that there are these local types exist. Often they are just young deer with 3x3 racks and that some individual coues can have different color variations.

 

Take it for whats its worth.

[desertdog]

I couldn't tell you if this is a fantail or just a small coues but a friend of mine took this buck about fifteen years ago down by Douglas. I can cover each beam with my hands and totally hide the horns. He calls it his "fantail" and says it was the smallest bodied deer that he has ever seen let alone taken.

 

 

 

Phil

 

 

Well just going by what was described to me if this in one it would be a monster. And also the picture just may make it look bigger than it really is. From what I was told the rack would be the size of a large grapefruit, or small cantaloupe. Sorry for the fruit talk. Its just the best way to describe it.

 

DD

[Young]

IHunt2live,

 

Yes, that tail looks similar except the whole tail was that color. The color of the hair on that coues in your photo is grey like a coues should be. The hair on these 2 doe's I saw, were much darker than the deer in your photo. I stiil could be wrong, just noticing the differences

[washingtondc]

I hope you don't take this the wrong way washingtondc but do you have an education in biology, or are you just an outdoors nut like the rest of use? I'm just wondering because you seem to know a whole lot.

 

I am not a biology major...and yes, I am an outdoor nut...I draw a lot of these animals and like reading on them.

 

I started by drawing a lot of these animals...then it turned into a hobby where I was actually reading about these animals and learning of their distinguishing features to try and draw them more precisely.

 

I think the best books are "Deer of the World" by Dr. Valerius Geist, and "White-Tailed Deer: Ecology and Management" by Lowell K. Hall (Editor).

 

I've been meaning to ask Dr. Geist if the scientific community is separating the North and South American white-tailed deer into two species...I have seen a thesis on this somewhere on the internet.

 

There is something fascinating with the open plains/savanna adapted animals. I am also looking into information on the Spanish Red Deer that lives in the Chaparral Habitats of Southern Spain.

 

[washingtondc]

I just read the section in "Deer of the Southwest" by Jim Heffelfinger were he mentions this. He says "its a common misconception" that there are these local types exist. Often they are just young deer with 3x3 racks and that some individual coues can have different color variations.

 

Take it for whats its worth.

 

I just got this book too...and it came in the mail yesterday!

[billrquimby]

>>>>>>>>>?I've been meaning to ask Dr. Geist if the scientific community is separating the North and South American white-tailed deer into two species...I have seen a thesis on this somewhere on the internet.?>>>>>>>>>>>

 

Valerius Geist is a respected authority on the world's deer, but his theories are not accepted by all authors. I also have read most of his work, as well as Hall's, Whitehead's, Kellogg's and Schwabland's, as well as those of lesser knowns. Geist tends to be a "lumper" while some others with comparable credentials are "splitters." Who is correct will be debated long after we laypeople are long gone. We hunters emphasize the most apparent visual differences -- color, size, shape of antler, etc. -- while such things as skull and bone measurements, location and absence/presence of glands, average length of tails and ears, etc. often are more important in taxonomy. After taking five (couesi in Arizona, texanus in Texas and eastern Colorado, borealis in Michigan, ocrourus in Wyoming, and macourus in Minnesota) of the many races of whitetails in North America, I found the differences between them were quite apparent to this hunter/artist/cervid enthusiast/author. As editor of the SCI record books for many years, I also inspected hundreds of photos of white-tailed deer from every U.S. state and across whitetail range in Canada. Your belief that visual differences among the southeastern U.S. races no longer exist because of translocations does not hold water.

 

>>>>>>>>>There is something fascinating with the open plains/savanna adapted animals. I am also looking into information on the Spanish Red Deer that lives in the Chaparral Habitats of Southern Spain.>>>>>>>>>>>>>

 

I shot a 6x6 trophy stag in the Toledo Mountains of Spain in the 1980s on my first trip to Europe. Its body was about the size of a large mule deer. Although we did not weigh it, I estimated it was 175 to 200 pounds after field dressing. Its antler beams were 34 inches long with perfect "crowns" on each side. The habitat we hunted reminded me of the country around Sonoita -- mostly gentle hills with oaks. Although red deer are the same species as elk/wapiti/maral, the Spanish subspecies (as did a much larger red deer I shot in New Zealand) lacked the neck ruff found on bull elk and the stag was a gray (not red) color overall. There are lots of good books and papers on the many Cervus elaphus races including hispanicus. One that may interest someone who is attempting to learn more about the world's deer is G. Kenneth Whitehead's "Encyclopedia of Deer."

 

Bill Quimby

[billrquimby]

Here's a photo of that Spanish stag. My hand is covering the sixth tine on the stag's left antler. Also, the photo has a heavy reddish hue overall and does not show the true color of the deer's coat. It is more gray than red. These are interesting animals, and the spookiest of any deer that I've hunted. It was after the rut (it's called the "roar" in Europe) and they had been heavily hunted. They would bolt at 350-400 yards at the first glimpse of a human. Note the "last meal" the guide placed in the stag's mouth after the typical European ceremony to honor the animal, the property owner, and the hunter.

 

Bill Quimby

[washingtondc]

>>>>>>>>>?I've been meaning to ask Dr. Geist if the scientific community is separating the North and South American white-tailed deer into two species...I have seen a thesis on this somewhere on the internet.?>>>>>>>>>>>

 

Valerius Geist is a respected authority on the world's deer, but his theories are not accepted by all authors. I also have read most of his work, as well as Hall's, Whitehead's, Kellogg's and Schwabland's, as well as those of lesser knowns. Geist tends to be a "lumper" while some others with comparable credentials are "splitters." Who is correct will be debated long after we laypeople are long gone. We hunters emphasize the most apparent visual differences -- color, size, shape of antler, etc. -- while such things as skull and bone measurements, location and absence/presence of glands, average length of tails and ears, etc. often are more important in taxonomy. After taking five (couesi in Arizona, texanus in Texas and eastern Colorado, borealis in Michigan, ocrourus in Wyoming, and macourus in Minnesota) of the many races of whitetails in North America, I found the differences between them were quite apparent to this hunter/artist/cervid enthusiast/author. As editor of the SCI record books for many years, I also inspected hundreds of photos of white-tailed deer from every U.S. state and across whitetail range in Canada. Your belief that visual differences among the southeastern U.S. races no longer exist because of translocations does not hold water.

 

>>>>>>>>>There is something fascinating with the open plains/savanna adapted animals. I am also looking into information on the Spanish Red Deer that lives in the Chaparral Habitats of Southern Spain.>>>>>>>>>>>>>

 

I shot a 6x6 trophy stag in the Toledo Mountains of Spain in the 1980s on my first trip to Europe. Its body was about the size of a large mule deer. Although we did not weigh it, I estimated it was 175 to 200 pounds after field dressing. Its antler beams were 34 inches long with perfect "crowns" on each side. The habitat we hunted reminded me of the country around Sonoita -- mostly gentle hills with oaks. Although red deer are the same species as elk/wapiti/maral, the Spanish subspecies (as did a much larger red deer I shot in New Zealand) lacked the neck ruff found on bull elk and the stag was a gray (not red) color overall. There are lots of good books and papers on the many Cervus elaphus races including hispanicus. One that may interest someone who is attempting to learn more about the world's deer is G. Kenneth Whitehead's "Encyclopedia of Deer."

 

Bill Quimby

 

Bill,

 

Thank you for clarifying your experience in viewing pictures of white-tailed deer. I respect works from Dr. Geist and I do have the Whitehead's Encyclopedia of Deer.

 

So you say that my belief does not hold water? Well, perhaps...I confess that I haven't seen a lot of pictures of these animals as you have...so yes, you have more experience than me. I have seen several books on white-tailed deer...and it would be great if there were books with photographs showing such regional variations of deer in the SE United States.

 

However, I am interested in knowing what distinguishes these different deer, and have had a tough time finding good photos that show clear distinctions. The white-tailed deer is a cool animal, and I would love to see some of the photos that you have seen.

 

I just wish a lot of this stuff would be made available. I did read Dr. Geist's work, and I think he is good with red deer and wapiti. I do like his stuff on mule deer too. The white-tailed deer, however, I don't know what other sources are available.

 

But, I would love to see what you have seen.

 

I know that some northern white-tailed deer have dark black on the their muzzle that goes near the eyes...but I don't know if this is distinctly a northern white-tailed deer thing.

 

cheers,

 

washingtondc

 

 

[billrquimby]

Color and facial patterns vary among individuals of the same race. Here is a borealis I shot in Michigan in about 1997-8. Ten other bucks taken on that hunt by other hunters at that camp had very little to no dark colors on their muzzles. However, they all had that certain similar "look" about them that said "northeastern whitetail."

 

Bill Quimby